The show must go on… and on | Ireland – The Times

The proposed merger of LN-Gaiety and MCD is raising questions about dominance in the live music industry

Brian Carey

Promoters Denis Desmond and Caroline DowneyJASON CLARKE

Members of the music scene gathered last Wednesday at Urban Plant Life, a garden centre in Dublin’s inner city, for the launch party of Electric Picnic 2019. The venue is a passing nod to the bucolic Co Laois setting of the successful outdoor music festival. Among hanging plants and funky lighting, the lucky invitees drifted between bars and DJ sets. It was almost like the real thing.

There was no hard sell, because there was no need for it. Tickets for Electric Picnic sold out long ago, regardless of the “amazing” line-up unveiled earlier in the day by Melvin Benn of Festival Republic, the organiser of Electric Picnic.

The live entertainment boom rolls on, and nobody is benefiting more than the shareholders in Festival Republic’s…